1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and a method of handling rod-shaped components, especially for a deep-drilling device used either in the onshore region or in the offshore region. Such deep-drilling devices can be employed for vertical drilling in terms of the development of fields. The term “field” involves especially the occurrence of a substance in liquid, gaseous or solid form or the presence of energetically exploitable conditions in geological structures, especially with respect to crude oil, natural gas or geothermal energy. By the term “rod-shaped component” hereinafter especially, but not exclusively, those components are understood whose longitudinal expansion is larger than their transverse expansion. Those components are preferably in tubular shape and serve for introducing drillings, for instance.
Vertical drilling is preferably employed for exploiting oil and gas fields and for generating geothermal energy.
The principle of the present invention is not restricted to the use for deep drilling, but can also be employed, for instance, for other drilling devices, for example for horizontal drilling devices or tilted drilling devices.
2.Description of the Related Art
From the state of the art a vertical drilling device is known, for instance in accordance with the patent specification EP 1387924 B1 in which a plurality of pipes forming a pipeline in the ground are arranged substantially vertically on a drilling platform prior to being introduced. In said patent specification an apparatus and a method are described by which it is ensured that upon introducing or removing pipes a respective one of two pipes is safely held by a fastening means. A typical method of vertically arranging the pipes consists in a conveying system having a gripper and placing the pipes into the desired vertical position.
An improvement with respect to the method described in EP 1387924 B1 consists in using drill rod gripping systems as described in DE 102004004315 A1 and shown in FIG. 1. A drilling mast 1 is mounted on a base 2 made of individual segments. At the drilling mast 1a carriage at which a top drive is provided is movable in vertical direction. With a drill rod 6 provided below the top drive at the carriage 4, the same can be inserted into the drill hole and a corresponding drilling operation can be performed through the top drive. Adjacent to the base 2 and on ground level a drill rod magazine 8 is provided in which the drill rods to be introduced are stored and on which drill rods removed from the drill hole are deposited. In this application DE 102004004315 A1 a drill rod gripper 10 is provided at a guide frame 12 for facilitating the provision of the drill rod. This drill rod gripper grips a drill rod 6a located on the drill rod magazine 8 perpendicularly to the connecting line of the drilling mast and the drill hole, pivots the same perpendicularly thereto via a position of the drill rod shown by 6b, performs a translational movement along the guide frame 12 into the position shown by FIG. 6C, pivots into a position above the drill hole and then permits to introduce the drill rod into the drill hole through the top drive provided at the carriage 4. For removing a drill rod from the drill hole an inverse order of proceeding is chosen.
Although with such pipe handling system as described in DE 102004004315 A1 the risk of loads floating at a crane is dropped. On the other hand, however, manual cooperation of an operating person is necessary to ensure safe moving of the drill rods to the drill rod magazine in a first step, safe gripping by the drill rod gripper 10, safe pivoting to the prescribed position below the top drive and safe insertion of the drill rod into the drill hole.
It has to be noted that in the case of conventional onshore rigs introducing drill rods to the magazine 8 is frequently carried out manually or by forklifts, which additionally impedes a safe gripping of individual drill rods.